Hi, and thanks for tuning in for another dose of Bite-Sized Bits of Knowledge, where we give you meaningful information in a short amount of time. Today, we’re going to talk about our proprietary unique improvement process, at least as it relates to the planning side.

As you know, we do wills, trusts, probate, business planning and asset protection, estate and business planning. We do a lot of planning from the business side and the estate side.

I want to tell you a little bit about our process because I think it’s unique, and I think you’re going to enjoy it. Starting with the first meeting. Our first meeting, we cover so much. We really get to know you. We really want to connect with you. My goal of the first meeting is to really just connect with you. To understand: Why are you here? What do you want to talk about? What are you saying that your goals are and what are you saying that you’re not saying that your goals are? 

It’s very common that there’s things that are driving decisions that are not really spoken. That are sensitive issues. And I like to think that I’m pretty good about getting it out, because once I get it out and there’s a comfortableness there with the client, that I can help to tailor solutions even better than the clients initially thought was possible.

And it’s a really rewarding and gratifying feeling to do that, because the clients come thinking that this is kind of it. And they get, I guess, educated, that there’s more. There’s better ways. There’s a lot more flexibility than you think.

So our process starts with that first meeting. We connect, we understand, we listen. We want to know your goals. We want to know your needs. We want to know your family dynamic. Every family is unique. We talk about your balance sheet, your approximate assets, where they are, how they’re titled. We talk about your liabilities, whose they are, how they’re titled. And of course, we go through all the advantages and disadvantages of the many options that we are going to discuss.

We want to make sure, and it’s a very big priority for us, that our clients make informed decisions. Informed decisions. We make sure that we invest the time to explain the options. We want to make sure that you feel comfortable asking questions. We don’t want you nodding in approval like, “Oh, okay.” You can tell. You can read in someone’s eyes when they really don’t understand, but they’re nodding because they just feel uncomfortable asking. We want you to be comfortable asking.

I don’t care if we got to have another meeting about it. I don’t care if we have to have another five meetings about it or another six calls. I’m going to make sure you understand what you’re doing and you’re very comfortable with what you’re doing. That’s very important to me and our team.

So that first meeting is very important. What is commonly done, in my experience, is that attorneys after that first meeting, next time you see them, you’re signing. And that’s crazy because there’s so much to talk about still. There’s so many issues to think through. There are so many details to flesh out.

So as part of our process, we send you what we call the letter confirming details. After we’re retained formally as your attorney, we send you this letter, and it basically says, “Here’s everything we talked about in our meeting. Here’s all the details.” You don’t have to write thing anything down, no notes, no nothing. Just boom, here it is. “Here’s some things we didn’t think about. Here are some things that we didn’t flesh out. You should talk to them about this. You should consider that.” And so forth.

That usually prompts another meeting or another call or both. In either case, it doesn’t matter because we’re happy to do it. We want to make sure we get it right. We want to make sure you understand exactly what you’re doing and what’s in those documents. It’s very important to us, if I’ve not said it enough, I cannot overstate that being a priority to us.

So that letter usually drives a couple more meetings and calls, but ultimately we draft, we send drafts for review, we talk about those too, and inevitably we’ll set up a time to sign. In COVID, we have a modified approach which works great, but in non-COVID times, signing is done the traditional way. Now, we do offer – I should note – we do offer complete electronic signing. And within the law electronic signing. It’s not just a DocuSign or a little Adobe Photoshop signing. There’s a whole process. It’s a real pain in the butt.

But we offer an electronic signing where it is convenient and necessary. We don’t advise you to do it, especially for wills because there’s a kind of a complication about wills when it comes to electronic signings, at least the way the law reads now. 

We can do anything. We’re very flexible and we just want to accommodate you and your needs and your conveniences. So I hope that that tells you a little bit about our planning process and I hope you find it helpful. 

So thank you for stopping by and stay tuned for more.